May 30, 2014 // 11:37 pm - Following up on news of the Game Genie for PS3, today Hyperkin Product Manager Chris Gallizzi revealed that a PS Vita Remote Play security loophole in the PS4's design may allow them to bring their Game Genie cheat device to the PlayStation 4.

While this may not be related to the rumored PS4 vulnerability or purported PS4 exploit found, it does sound promising indeed using a hidden Wi-Fi signal to detect a backdoor entry to the system!

To quote: GAME GENIE EYES PLAYSTATION 4

In 2012, just over two decades after its creation, Game Genie made a quiet return to market. It had a new look and a new company backing it, and it operated in a completely different style than its predecessors. This new Game Genie, developed by Hyperkin for the PlayStation 3 and Nintendo DS, modified your save game to give you extra lives or ammo.

According to Chris Gallizzi, product manager at Hyperkin, this is a much more rigid system than what the older Game Genie enjoyed. Gaining access to a game's save files means cracking several layers of encryption, a process that changes from game to game. It's slow, time-consuming work that limits the product to only the games Gallizzi and his three-person team have cracked.

Gallizzi may have found a way to bring Game Genie to PlayStation 4 thanks to a security loophole in the PS4's design. "The key to the PlayStation 4 is the Vita," he explained, "and the Vita is not as secure as people think."

However, Gallizzi thinks he may have found a way to recapture some of that old Game Genie craziness thanks to a security loophole in the PlayStation 4's design. "The key to the PlayStation 4 is the Vita," he explained, "and the Vita is not as secure as people think.

By syncing the Vita to the PS4, we are then able to pick up a hidden Wi-Fi signal to detect a backdoor entry to the system. From there, we're able to access the raw game files, like trophy data and partially encrypted game saves. It still needs work, but the ultimate goal is to be able to mod a game file or the actual PUP files while the game is running--similar to DEX modding for the PS3, which allows real-time memory hacks."

So far, Gallizzi and his team have been successful in modifying only two games--Battlefield 4 and Tomb Raider--on the PS4, and even then, neither game is very stable. It will be a while before this technology is ready for public consumption, but when it is it will open up games in ways the PS3 and DS Game Genies could not.

"What this technology would allow us to do is actually modify the game data, similar to how the orignal Game Genie functioned," Gallizzi said. "From there we could do things like jumping over a whole level in a single bound or explore the game coding and find hidden stuff that was never fully deleted, stuff that's not seen in save data but is actually within game code."

Gallizzi and his team are aware that the gaming landscape has changed since the days of the original Game Genie. Massively multiplayer online games and competitive online gaming have taken hold, and those are two areas of gaming the team knows to stay away from.

"We have one golden rule," said Gallizzi, "and that is to never go into online gaming. We don't want to disrupt the competitive communities for Call of Duty or Battlefield or any of those games. We make sure that if you're using our hacks or cheats or whatever, you're doing it in your own little world."